A description and critical review is given about the fashion blog The Sartorialist, written by two students of the Amsterdam Fashion Institute: Madieke van der Zee and Romy Hooghuis.

In addition to the minor Fashion in marketing and retail, we were assigned to do an extensive research about a fashion blog. In our case we thought we would learn the most by choosing the American fashion blog: the Sartorialist.

Who is the genius founder behind this successful blog the Sartorialist? And who came up with the idea of creating a two-way dialogue about the world of fashion and its relationship to daily life (source)? It all began in September 2005 (source), when founder/blogger/photographer Scott Schuman resigned from his career as a fashion sales-man. At this point he began carrying a digital camera around the streets of New York, taking pictures of people who had dressed in a way that caught his eye, and then posting them to the blog he created.

The blog uses different kinds of social media to spread its words, images and inspiration, namely Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. The blog’s twitter account has 182.000 followers and 3828 tweets, which is being updated continuously. On Facebook the Sartorialist has 288.769 likes. On Instagram the blog has 443.587 followers and 1367 posts.

The main goal Scott Schuman wants to achieve with the Sartorialist is to create an online platform which gives inspiration by showing how fashion designers look at street fashion. In another way he also wants to inspire these fashion designers, by showing and knowing their way of hunting for inspiration (source). With his blog Scott Schuman succeeded in making an online platform that creates inspiration for fashion designers but also for the ordinary people around the globe, eventually giving these people the opportunity to translate their inspiration in their daily life. The Sartorialist shoots inspiring people on the streets of New York, so the fashion category is focusing on consists of the total package of those people. It can be the outfit someone is wearing, but also the shoes or a remarkable hat that someone is wearing. By evaluating the blog we think that the overall appearance of these people is the most important in order to create an inspiring image.

A new feature (launched in 2014) in the Sartorialist, faces by the Sartorialist, is an eyewear category, described as: style, fashion and eyewear seen through Scott Schuman’s lens. There are no ads on the Sartorialist, but the blog does refer to other creative sites; Agency&Image Syndication, Jed Root, Gallerist, Danziger Projects and Garance Roré. On the Sartoralist itself Scott Schuman doesn’t refer to brands. but the page of faces by the Sartorialist does mention the brand, which produces the specific glasses.

Over the years the role of the Sartorialist in the fashion scene has become very important. It has become a blog that is being used as a source of inspiration for fashion designers all over the world. Besides the usage of experts in fashion, the blog is also being used as inspiration by all kinds of people that just have an interest in fashion. As a result the blog has increased massively over the last years and also became more and more used by the mainstream (source).

We think the Sartorialist had and is still is having a huge impact at the fashion scene. The Sartorialist was one of the first blogs that really succeeded in translating useful inspiration for fashion designers to an online platform. The blog was also one of the first that became commercially recognized by the mainstream.

The overall visual style of the Sartorialist is being characterized by its simplicity and minimalistic approach. The dominating color is white, which puts your attention to the images. The colors and brightness of these images are of high quality, what makes the images immediately stand out.

There are several website’s where consumers can give their opinion about the Sartorialist, for example on Twitter and Facebook. Also consumers can leave their comments directly on the online platform of the Sartorialist itself. Most consumers who gave their opinions are very positive about features as the concept, the photography and the inspiration it provides. For instance Travisal D., a consumer who gave her opinion on Sitejabber: ‘The Sartorialist website is really nice for selecting the clothes with various styles and fashion. And the most thing which liked about this website is that, it is having very good contact with the customer. And thus it is really useful in all aspects.’

After the search for reviews on the Sartorialist, we can conclude that in most cases the blog is useful for the consumers who are searching for inspiration they can translate into their own style. The Sartorialist doesn’t have a specific target group, but focusses on a micro culture that is sharing the same values relating to how they approach and create their style (source). With his blog, Scott Schuman mostly refers to people that are in his eyes stylish icons. These people have been chosen by their look or their appearance at that specific moment and not because they are famous. Although the Sartorialist wants to be accessible for the mainstream, it also wants to radiate a certain kind of style, personality and story that makes the blog create value for the micro culture it wants to reach. The Sartorialist has created a press category, which shows to what extend other mediums refer to the blog. It’s a list of 31 different sources.

He received what he described as ‘beautiful emails’ that were referring to his blog. He realized that the Sartorialist could be more than just a hobby, something he could really make a living with. The emails contain words of people who really love the Sartorialist, saying how much it means to them. ‘’When someone takes the time to actually take action and sit down and write a beautiful, heartfelt email – and you could read it and really tell it was heartfelt – that’s when you know you’re onto something’’, said Scott Schuman. The Sartorialist is a blog with inspirationalphotography of people he spots on the streets of New York. Eventually the Sartorialist now shows inspirational images taken all over the world. It is a flexible fulltime job. Scott uses the streets to get himself and its readers inspired. It’s obvious that he spends a lot of energy to his blog.

What we can conclude after this assignment is that the Sartorialist has developed into one of the leading fashion blog’s that serves as a source of inspiration for designers, consumers and probably a lot more. At first the Sartorialist was something new, innovating, and evolutionary, something what was never done, but nowadays the Sartorialist has become more commercial and is serving as an example for others. As a result the whole world thinks it can be a successful blogger. Although the blog has to cope with a lot of competition, the Sartorialist remains a great and useful source for their daily readers.